Indiana State Fair is quiet, eerily so, after stage collapse

ERIC BRADNER / Courier & Press
Genevieve Ware-Williams, a 60-year-old Boonville, Ind., native, has worked for decades at a fair in Milwaukee. This, she said, is her first year employed by a vendor at the Indiana State Fair. She fanned herself on a slow afternoon on Thursday.

INDIANAPOLIS - The crowd at the Indiana State Fair on Thursday was quiet — eerily so, some longtime fairgoers said.

This year's 17-day event is headed into its last weekend, but the stage collapse that killed five people and injured more than 40 on Saturday has thinned the crowd and seemed to dim the mood of those who are there.

"It does bother you. It could have been one of our families," said Donna Hendren, a 63-year-old Indianapolis woman who said she hasn't missed a fair since she was a child. She was there Thursday with her 4-year-old grandson, Noah Hendren.

Hendren said her son, Jacob, had planned to attend the Sugarland concert where the collapse occurred. However, he just left the Air Force and is set to start college and got too busy to make it.

Though Noah didn't notice it — when asked how he was enjoying the fair, he threw his hands up in the air, jumped and launched into a dance move — Donna Hendren said the atmosphere is unlike what she's seen before.

"I think it's just that people are more cautious," she said. "There's reverence for the situation."

Julie Woods has been a regular at the Indiana State Fair since 1989, when she saw her first concert — Def Leppard — on the same stage that collapsed Saturday.

She brought her 9-year-old daughter, Monica Boyer, to the fair — the first one she'd be old enough to remember — Thursday afternoon.

For Boyer, the highlight was the petting zoo. For Woods, who lives in Lebanon, Ind., and watched coverage of the collapse, the scene was striking.

They stopped and said a prayer at a memorial built for the five victims, plus the more than 40 people who were injured, Saturday night.

"It's a somber feeling to know how fragile life is," Woods said. "Especially someplace like the fair, where you go to celebrate summer and have a good time."

Jason and Laura McCoy, an Indianapolis couple who brought their two sons — Mitchell, 4, and Leland, 1 — to the fair Thursday, said it's usually more crowded.

They parked in the infield, which is usually packed by the time they've clipped their pass for free admission out of the local newspaper and carved out a day for the trip.

The McCoys said they planned to stay for dinner, and at that point, they'd really be able to see the difference in the size of the crowd.

"There's no reason you shouldn't continue coming," Jason McCoy said. "Other than that incident, the fair has always been really safe."

Karen and Howard Hosfield, who live in Lebanon, Ind., said they've visited the Indiana State Fair each of the 39 years they've been married — and, perhaps, even further back, into their teens.

The biggest difference, they both said, is that there is less noise coming from the area around grandstands and the stage that collapsed than usual, because that area is closed.

"I think it's humbling," Karen Hosfield said.

It's the second day the two have spent at the fair this year. The first was the second day it was open. They go each year for the elephant ears and the corn on the cob — "we eat our way through," she said.

They said they'll be back next year — when she said she expects the fair to return to its normal spirit.

For now, Karen Hosfield said, "it's a different atmosphere. The crowd looks smaller."